The unsteady laminar boundary layer flow of a nanofluid and heat transfer over a permeable shrinking cylinder using the Buongiorno’s nanofluid model is investigated. Using a similarity transformation, the governing partial differential equations are transformed into a system of ordinary differential equations and then solved numerically using a shooting method. The numerical results are obtained for velocity, temperature and concentration profiles as well as the skin friction coefficient, the local Nusselt number and the local Sherwood number. Dual solutions are found to exist in a certain range of the suction and unsteadiness parameters. It is observed that suction parameter increase both the skin friction coefficient and the heat transfer rate at the surface, whereas the opposite trend is obtained for the Sherwood number. It is also observed that suction widens the range of the unsteadiness parameter for which the solution exists.